MAO MOCKED

Mr Li is flabbergasted Chinese students spoke so reverently of Mao, glossing over his murderous regime and comparing him with Jesus Christ, as they protested the lampooning of him on the cover of a student newspaper this week.

He said students have been brainwashed by the Chinese government, which keeps the education sector and media under tight control.

“Mao is depicted as a genius. He was a genius - an evil genius, like Hitler,” Mr Li said yesterday.

“Seventy million people died because of his cruel and stupid rule.”

Extra points to Mr. Li for identifying Mao’s rule as “stupid”. This is something that routinely escapes stupid historians.

At least the Chinese students have an excuse. They were educated under one of the most repressive regimes on earth, with all of their textbooks approved by the government. Our own students, with their Che t-shirts and Che posters have no problem idolizing a brutal mass murderer, and no excuse.

An index on the the front page in Saturday’s South China Morning Post says “Millions were swept up in the fervour of Mao Zedong’s Cultural Revolution. But for China to grow, it must reject Mao and his legacy.” The photos and op-ed are buried in pages 7, 12 & 13. I don’t think much is thought of Mao here in Hong Kong.

#6 lmassie:
I’m here until October. I’m loving it. An ex-pat colleague of 11 years here has called it 11 summers! I’m in an apartment in Causeway Bay, just 200m from the office. Sounds like you visit here. The heat hasn’t really hit, and the typhoon just missed Honkers.

Stevo, you must be a night owl.
I’ve a mate named Igor who used to live in HK. He loved it. Ran the Hash.
I get there often as I fly from the States to Perth several times a year. Going through again end of June, but just a layover. Usually stay in the Charterhouse Hotel in Wan Chi. Do like the place but after 3 days the hustle and bustle gets to me. That and not having anything to do but eat and shop. Gets old. Same problem in Sydney, but Sydney has Bondi and topless girls.

#8 lmassie:
Yep, a night owl, watching James Bond movies on widescreen cable. I have neither back in Sydney. 007 movies are corny. Nothing about Mao in the paper yesterday, although HK was British ruled back then. Charterhouse Hotel is closer to Causeway Bay than Wan Chai. I’m at Lanson Place, only about 4 months new.

#18 There are too many to name, unfortunately. Obviously, mhar4 was not around in the universities of the late 60s and mid 70s when history students were indoctrinated in the ‘noble’ experiments of Mao, who was thought to be revolutionising socialism, instead of burying it under millions of Chinese bodies.
No propaganda from China in those years was thought too rich to be swallowed whole by an academic Western left, disillusioned by the reality of the Czechoslovakia invasion.

mhar4, are you saying that there is no such thing as a stupid historian? That’s a very far stretch; any profession or trade has a certain number of stupid people, simply through a Bell curve distrubution if nothing else.

Or are you asking because you are an historian yourself? And perhaps feel professionally insulted? If so, grow a thicker skin.

In either case, I’ll offer a definition of a stupid historian, and we can see how historians fit: Someone who rewrites history to reflect their personal values or political values without regard to actual historical events.

As an example, historians who depict Mao so some sort of saint, when in fact he contributed greatly to Communism’s body count of 100 million victims in the 20th century. Pol Pot comes to mind as well. And Stalin.

I’m unfortunately not old enough to have been at school or university in the 60s or 70s, but I’d really love to know any modern historian who eulogises Mao or Stalin.

My memory of school is a video on the dictators which described Stalin killing millions, and Mao killing tens of millions through induced famine.

I’ve never read a history which denies this; the closest I’ve seen is WWII historians (e.g. Winston Churchill) who considered Stalin’s brutality during WWII to some small degree justified given the foe the allies were facing. I know of no-one who excuses or denies the post war terror.

For instance, judging from titles and prefaces, all the books in the University of Sydney library on the Chinese famine and the Ukranian famine are supportive of the idea that they were caused by Mao and Stalin’s deliberate policy, and killed a great many innocents. I know this isn’t a great research methodology (it’s only 5 big, and I’m judging the Ukranian one just from its title), but it’s something.

So which historians? I’ve looked, and not found any. Names please, and a book somewhere in an Australian library; if I’ve time I’ll go and have a read.

If we wanted to expand beyond the confines of apologists for Mao and his murderous Chinese Commies we could name Jerry Hough, who rewrote “Smolensk Under Soviet Rule” into a paean to the Brave New Soviet Society, thus turning a useful book of scholarship into a mess of propaganda lies. He also thinks that Stalin’s Purges of the late 1930s killed about 10,000 people, which is off by at least two orders of magnitude in the numbers outright shot, let alone the millions who later died in the camps.

There is also J. Arch Getty, who also belittled the casulaties of the Purges and extolled the wonderfulness of Commie rule in Russia.

I suppose one could argue that these guys are not stupid, just dishonest liars, academic Walter Durantys. I won’t object.

Do you begin to see a pattern here to the stupidity and dishonesty of certain historians? Why they must be real historians, and not just biassed propaganda liars, for they have tenured chairs at major universities. That proves it, right?

I could have added David Irving,who has written books purporting to be history books, but who is not actually considered an historian, except by moonbats, and who never had a faculty position. He does qualify under the stupid and dishonest catagories, however. Being a Nazi apologist will do that to you, just as surely as being a Commie apologist will.

Now we are seeing tenured apologists among Western lefty academics for the Islamists (e.g. Juan Cole). So long as murderous, totalitarian swine hate freedom, liberty, capitalism, the USA, and the Jews they will never lack for tenured apologists and supporters.

Extra points to Mr. Li for identifying Mao’s rule as “stupid”. This is something that routinely escapes stupid historians.

#23

Obviously I meant rountine(?!) examples of historians failing to understand the horrors of Mao’s rule. And no, Real Jeffs, I am not an historian. And indeed, if I recall, you are a big fan of Communist propaganda.

#26

John K. Fairbank? What are you, nuts? Among many things, in the 1950s Fairbank was an advocate for Taiwanese independence, which earned him the lifelong ire of both the ChiComs and the ChiNats.

#24 and #27
Patrick, I define a ‘modern historian’ as someone writing about contemporary events and teaching students attitudes towards them. This is exactly what Maoist historians did in the 60s and 70s, and many of them are still around today; though one or two might have publicly recanted, most just ignore their own past.
I vividly recall a raving English historian claiming that Mao was ‘creating a New Man’in China about 1970. It shouldn’t be hard to find such books even today.
It is the unwillingness of such marxist historians to admit they were stupid and wrong that is so sickening. The recent stupid attacks on Keith Windschuttle are an Australian case in point.

mhar4: Michael is showing you a continuing trend in leftist teachers, and their close similarity with old fascist/marxist ones -why don’t you notice this, and learn?

And no, Real Jeffs, I am not an historian. And indeed, if I recall, you are a big fan of Communist propaganda.

Tsk, tsk, mhar4. You recall wrong. I enjoyed a Chinese movie that you consider Communist propaganda. There’s a difference. (Hint: I reviewed Tim’s archives to see what the fuck you were talking about. You might try that sometime.)

OK, you’re not a historian, which I inferred from your web site which includes, oddly enough, a fair amount of history. My bad.

But you didn’t respond to the first part of my original point:

mhar4, are you saying that there is no such thing as a stupid historian? That’s a very far stretch; any profession or trade has a certain number of stupid people, simply through a Bell curve distrubution if nothing else.

Instead, you indulged in ad hominem attacks. Wotta surprise. For someone who is not a historian, you are awfully defensive of them.

You just have no idea what you are talking about.

Such a brilliant and literate response! What a compelling argument! I’m so impressed.

You’re so full of it. Give me one example of John Howard unequivocally condemning China’s current human rights record. He never has, and that’s sickening.

Well, neither has Bush, for that matter. The State Department, so-so. But I don’t see anyone on this thread openly supporting Chinese human rights either; indeed, I don’t ever recall anyone on this blog doing that and not being booed down. So why the piss, mhar4?

I ask because YOU dropped a question requesting people to name a stupid historian. YOU ignored the main point of the thread (i.e., Mao is not a saint). YOU diverted the thread away from something that you later bitch about Howard not doing.

I don’t expect you to answer, given your performance thus far. But you should take note that bullshit wrapped up in a diploma remains bullshit.

Actually, the Bush administration, and Bush specifically, has a very good record on raising human rights issues with the Chinese, and he stands by Taiwan, which makes him alright by me.

Blair has made some strong statements, too. Red Ken Livingstone, Mayor of London, however, is a shameful disgrace.

As to stupid historians, oh there are plenty, and I have worked with a few, but to return to the original point, give me one example of a historian in the last ten years who has written one positive thing about Mao, let alone “routinely”. I can’t think of any. I can think of lots of examples of great scholars, many in Australia, who have done a huge amount to expose Mao’s monstrousness and go some way to trying to understand how he was able to wreak the havoc that he did.

...give me one example of a historian in the last ten years who has written one positive thing about Mao, let alone “routinely”. I can’t think of any.

mhar4, your original commnet was:

This is something that routinely escapes stupid historians.

Name one.

You are moving the goalposts. Granted, it’s a good move, since your original post was extremely vague. But you get my point, I think.

As to the last 10 years for good things about Mao…..honestly, I am hard pressed to do that for Mao. On the other hand, empirical evidence indicates that there are historians who have recently written positive things about Mao (Read this…again). Or at least the older books haven’t been re-written. Historians and teachers within the Chinese government clearly are involved with this.

But that’s within China, isn’t it? So, moving the goalposts myself, there are people who still say positive things about Mao’s peers outside of China. Castro comes to mind. Pol Pot, Che, and Stalin as well.

As for Bush…..I’m not so keen on his stance towards China. Yes, he does support Taiwan, but not as much as the USA used to. There’s too much courting of Chinese business these days, partially encouraged by the Administration. This is an economically driven stance, and I understand it. But dealing with China leaves a sour taste in my mouth.

What the hell are you talking about? Of course young Chinese from the mainland have a positive view of Mao. Anything else would require a serious public reassessment of China’s communist history and we all know that the CCP doesn’t countenance that because its a damned dictatorship. Anyway, it’s so much more complex that you understand. Mao is also a figure of nostalgia in China, a figure of kitch. Chinese kids download Mao images onto the mobile phones. Bizarre? Yes, but there it is. Modern China.

But the thrust of the original post, and some of the subsequent comments, was that there are bleeding-heart idiot leftist China historians in the West who somehow routinely fail to understand or write about the horrors, stupidities and distasters of Mao and Maoism. But that is just wrong. There are not any.

How about all those Che Guevara t-shirts being sold in the US? And he’s a “hero” from Cuba and South America.

So you think I don’t understand Mao place in popular culture? For me, your comment was a “No shit, Sherlock!” moment. Get a grip on reality, would you? (That’s another thing that don’t go with diplomas, by the way.)

And I clearly said “But that’s within China, isn’t it?” So your faux outrage is more than a little faux.

Really, mhar4, you’ve contributed nothing of value to this thread, other than virtually hosing the place with your testostrone.

Come back when you have something substantial to say on the thread topic. All you and I are doing is talking past each other. And pixels are far too precious a commodity to waste doing that.

He won’t, nofixedabode. mhar4 has a serious ‘tude problem, and isn’t listening very well. He dismissed all earlier answers (not just mine) with equal rudeness. For him, trying harder means banging on the keyboard with more force.

Personally, I think mhar4 is pissed because Tim dared to diss historians. But that’s just me, y’know?

Personally, I think mhar4 is pissed because Tim dared to diss historians. But that’s just me, y’know?

Indeed he did. And I am just after some empircal evidence to support the proposition. Just one name of a contemporary historian of China in the West who fails to understand the horrors, stupidities and distasters of Mao and Maoism. Just one name. C’mon.

You’ve been offered several. You brushed them off as “irrelevant”, “You’re so full of it”, etc, with no substantiation as to why. You offered only a couple of counterpoints on others. “Condescending” may be too strong a word to describe your behavior, but I can think of no better one right now.

I’m seeing no intention of having a serious discussion from you. This was your mode of operation in earlier threads, and a major reason why I don’t take you seriously.

Who? Fairbank? That’s absurd to describe him as apologist for Mao. He died in 1991, too. Have you read him? Who else? I followed the links above and found a reference to a missionary who died in 1993 at the age of 95, something about the Chinese community in California recognizing Mao’s birth, and a dead link. That’s it? What about contemporary historians? A single name.

Well there you have it, that’s the way trolls argue: they demand you prove your assertions, and when you do, they claim that your proof does not meet their requirements. Straight out of the “How To Run a Re-Education Camp” handbook.

Talking of Maoists, has anybody read this history lesson? Some interesting apologists were heavily influenced including historian Henry Reynolds, the ususal assortment of ABC journalists, economists, political professors and others…good read.

Apparently not any that you will admit to. “One” quotes a Berkeley professor praising Mao, and alludes to others who have greater praise for him. “Two”, not a dead link but a link requiring registration, lists authors (in and out of China) who praise Mao. I’m not gonna violate their intellectual property rights by reposting their work here, you’ll just have to register. “Three”... well, I guess you were still in diapers at the time, but the early ‘90s is still pretty contemporary to us adults.

If you want to trawl all the people who have praised Mao over the decades, then you’d better include Nixon and Kissinger.

But that ignores the mountain of publishing over the last twenty years damning Mao - Barmé, Goldman, Becker, Link, Apter and Saitch, Nathan, on and on and on, a concerted, serious effort to understand Mao’s legacy and recognize its horrors. There is just not a single professional China historian working today that I can think of who would do anything other than lament Mao. What about them?

Too bad you didn’t try this tactic at the start, mhar4. Y’know, something along the lines of: “Hey, yeah, I know, there are stupid historians out there, but here is some good reading from people who aren’t stupid enough to idiolize Mao.”

Instead, you spend a couple days being a rude pain in the arse, moving the goalposts, rejecting answers, and in general behaving like a troll.

Maybe your list is valid, and maybe it’s not. I’ll have to look at it and see. But if you want to be taken seriously, maybe you should change your approach away from screeching and more towards teaching, hmmmmmm?

By all means… DAMN NIXON AND KISSINGER. The damage they did to this nation is unforgivable. But that’s another thread. Kissinger, not that he matters any longer, is still a Mao apologist.

You challenged us to “Name one”. That “one” being (from the original post) ”... identifying Mao’s rule as “stupid”. This is something that routinely escapes stupid historians.”

You’ve been given numerous examples of professors, historians and authors who, having had a lot to say about Mao, fail to acknowledge the sheer stupidity of his reign, not to mention the complete disconnect from reality that Marxism requires to begin with.

You know what, mhar? Fuck you, your question has been answered over and over again, and now you’re ordering people to do more research until they find an answer that satisfies YOU? For being an asshole, you’re banned.

Today is I’m Sick of Troll Shit Day. By the way, any emails I get from trolls complaining about how I’ve banned them will be published both here and on MY blog. With email links.

Unlike you, I don’t go for a post-modern, all-truth-is-relative view of the world. Hero was the Party-line, pure and simple.

You know me so well, mhar4. Not. Yeah, you’re banned (and good riddance!), but I’m still going to respond. Here, not at your blog, not after being such an ass.

But is that what pisses you off so much? That I enjoyed a movie that you hated? Especially since said movie was 90% bullshit martial arts special effects, 8% character interaction, and 2% romance?

“Hero” was a typical Jet Li movie, lotsa improbably fights using special effects, but not a lot of deep thought. The major political moment was when Jet Li (as the assassin) acknowledged that Chinese unity—under a single Emperor—to stop the constant strife was important enough to die for.

Is that a Party line? More accurately, is that a line to the Communist Party? I don’t think so.

Was the portrayal supportive of the current regime? Possibly.

Is this pure and simple? No!

We have a difference of opinion here, mhar4. Over a fucking movie. Is that why you’re such an ass?

Please note: you must use a real email address to register. You will be sent an account activation email. Clicking on the url in the email will automatically activate your account. Until you do so your account will be held in the "pending" list and you won't be able to log in. All accounts that are "pending" for more than one week will be deleted.